Hog raisers and livestock feed millers in Calabarzon are urging the national government to expedite the African Swine Fever (ASF) vaccination process amid the anticipated high demand for pork during the Holiday season.
Rico Geron, chief executive officer of the Batangas-based Sorosoro Ibaba Development Cooperative, said the national government should tap the private sector in the inoculation process, especially that both hog raisers and livestock feed millers are already feeling the adverse effects of the ASF.
For the cooperative alone, Geron said they have around 73,000 farmers, half of them are engaged in backyard hog-raising, who are affected by the ASF.
“We are offering ourselves to help to make the inoculation process swifter, as hogs continue to deplete in Calabarzon (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal, Quezon) due to ASF. Not only that, feed millers are losing 50 percent of their revenues because of the depletion of pigs in the farm and the backyards,” said Geron in a press briefing.
Geron explained that there is an urgency to finish the ASF vaccination in the soonest possible time amid the expected demand for pork.
“We are anticipating that pork meat prices will increase in the coming weeks toward the Holiday Season if the rolling out of the ASF vaccine inoculation process will not be done faster. We ask the Department of Agriculture and the President to tap us and receive our being offered help in this process,” said Geron.
On the part of the Cavite Farmers Feedmilling and Marketing Cooperative, its general manager Alice Maraan said their main concern is where to get the vaccines.
“If our members who are into backyard hog-raising are affected by the ASF, feed millers also suffer. What we want is for the government to double-time the vaccination process,” Maraan said.
The national government, through the DA, earlier ordered 10,000 ASF vaccines from Vietnam. The vaccination was already started in Batangas after the first batch of the vaccines arrived last month.
But Pork Producers Federation of the Philippines, Inc. representative Fritz Kenneth Chua, who also owns a livestock farm in Quezon, said the vaccination appears to be taking a lot of time.
“The vaccine is readily available and yet the rollout is so sluggish. What is happening?” he asked.
In the same press briefing, AGAP Partylist Representative Nick Briones criticized the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for being the one who hinders the total rollout of the inoculation process
“They have so many tests to do. The problem is already here, so why are they not acting fast? Lives of our hogs and swine are at stake here, as well as the livelihood of our industry,” he said.
As of last week, the ASF has affected 209 municipalities across the country. Only the vaccine from Vietnam has been approved by the FDA for a limited government-controlled rollout of 10,000 that was allocated in Batangas.
DA Secretary Francisco Tiu Laurel earlier said that the government-controlled vaccination against African swine fever (ASF) will be expanded to the Visayas and Mindanao as soon as more ASF vaccines arrive.